The struggle of the butterfly
by loose
Summary: Faith and Buffy Post-Chosen


_Disclaimers: I don't own the characters. _

_Pairing: is Buffy/Faith all the way. Nothing graphic though. _

_Summary : Post-Chosen fic Kinda weird fic, with lots of babbling and words weirdness all around._

Sometimes.

Sometimes life is tricky and love to play us.

Sometimes I wish I was never born at all yet I'm always so hungry for life.

One day you wake up and just see everything, a everything that just a few seconds ago was foreign and far away.

Like when you're a kid and all of a sudden the most silly things, like watching the movement of your hand made you realize that you're real, that you exist, the fingers curling into a fist slowly at first and faster then, hypnotize you into knowledge, gift you with the feeling of being real and for the shortest second is all clear. And then as the fingers kept moving the knowledge slips away from you again and it's gone, just gone.

Hands.

How much it hurt when he holds her hand.

I see his fingers curling around her hand, the thumb smoothing over her always bruised knuckles, gently, knowingly.

As if he knew.

As if they belonged to each other.

I should be happy for her.

And I am.

But not really.

A part of me would always wish for her to live in pain.

To suffer.

To pay.

Because she had showed me a thousand colours and then had ran black paint over it.

Black as the lipstick she used to wear, back then, when to assert the claim darkness had over her soul she needed inexpensive dye.

Back then when a lot of her was fake and her image was only a projection of truths that had been shoved down her throat all her life.

She was like a creature that doesn't know better. A beautiful wild creature, that doesn't know how to fit into the world and have to force the world to fit around her and that really couldn't care about the results.

A creation of beauty, such a the Earth, of full and foolish beauty.

She was not sweet child mind you, she had never been but she was innocent and wild, unaware all the way of what is considered a sin, unaware of what should plague a person with guilt. Fake moral of human doing wasn't allowed to poison her.

Back then.

And to spat at her hateful words such as slut and whore, was the only way to built walls and to preserve fake belief intact, to stood above her and pretend to live while Faith breathed and lived for real.

As we struggled with pain.

And love.

Love she wasn't allowed to know back then, because of her nature.

The love that kills you, or that you have to kill, just to survive.

She wasn't ready to surrender to that kind of love. Or maybe I wasn't worth the risk.

And that thought drugged me with rage, every moment while I longed for her to turn back as she walked away but no . . . she never walked, she didn't walk back then, she rushed off as a twirl of night . . . weird thought and I can't explain it.

It was all in the combination of row yet graceful power and innocent lust.

Innocent lust I fell in love with. The natural innate feel of her that only shined when she smiled, for real, without hiding behind her predatory smirk.

She trembled on the edge unwilling to jump for so long, unwilling and scared to just let me in . . .

Until she opened that thick door, and not just a crack for me to peek into! She blew the fucking door away allowing me to fully step into her. Into us. It happened one early morning, she whispered her love for me with her fingers on a cold misty surface, love disguised by murder, a heart could not mean vampire, not to her. Never to her, since vampires keep taking the ones she loved from her.

And I was eager to leap into her and be hers as she was mine and to damn anything that wasn't us.

The feeling.

It filled everything, filled every holes in me, reached everything, drugged everything into madness and brought sense to everything that was already madness to me.

As love should.

We strolled through the night while the stars acted as silent witness of our love and the moon blessed us looking pleased and full to my eyes as I tangled my hands into her thick heavy hair, while pressing my lips against her trembling mouth to silence her as she tried to toss her head back and scream my name to the fucking night, to the fucking stars, to the fucking moon and to everyone prepared to know that she was mine and that I was hers.

She seared that truth into me with her lips, her touch, and her smell. Sometimes I wished I could stop breathing after drawing in her scent. She smelled of night and life and me. Always me. And love. If such a thing is possible, I don't care, I just know, she smelled of love when we where together.

Or maybe I'm just turning the memory into a romantic fairy tale. Wouldn't be a bad thing considering that anyway now is over. For real.

He has her now.

And Robin wouldn't let her go.

He is no fool.

But maybe she . . . she'll force him into leaving her . . . she'll go evil again and he'll leave her.

And I'm disgusted at myself for even thinking that, for even hoping to get a reason to hate her again at full force.

Without mercy.

Like before after she committed a sin.

A real sin.

A sin even a spotless souls like hers could identify as such.

Her dark dress got strained with red, a shocking event that made her aware of the world, of the world beyond us, the world that wouldn't leave her alone with me no as she ached to be.

She pretended everything away, everything that could remind her of the world, even me.

Me.

I tried to help her. I really did. But not really.

And she knew. She fucking knew that we were over in the exact moment Finch's blood painted the pale skin of her hand we were over.

Didn't matter what I said. She read it in my eyes. She always read everything in my eyes.

She wouldn't believe my offer to help her and I'm ashamed to admit that she had been right to not believe me. After all this time I can step out of this comfortable lightfull shadow, I used to hide myself everytime it came to her, to us and to that night that took us away.

I don't feel guilty or anything over that but I feel shame, I did not commit any crime but I hadn't been there for her.

I couldn't for my own sake, in order to keep my sanity I had to believe that it hadn't been an accident.

Perverse reasoning I know.

It had been her fault. She hadn't been good enough, fast enough. Slayer enough.

I had to believe that or I wouldn't have been able to get out and be a Slayer anymore.

Fear. It could've frozen me. Fear everytime I raised my stake. Fear to pierce a beating heart instead of an already death one.

It had been her fault. It hadn't been an accident.

An accident could have happened to me too. Like Ted. But I love to think that somehow there I knew that he wasn't human all along.

Somehow, somewhere in that small part of me that make me better then Faith.

But not really . . .

Once the Council had finished with her she was too damage for me to love.

I wanted a lover and not an hunted killer . . . I already had one of those. No fun.

And Angel was there again carrying the echoes of what we had in the soft eyes I loved so much before the demon took over, to fall back into him was safer in a way, because I knew, I already knew that our love was hopeless. It wasn't going to last, no matter what I did, no matter what he did, there was nothing to damage there. It was already destined to end.

It was written on a tombstone. And I could just live it and wait . . . no work there.

Just feeling it.

But with her . . . the result was a wild guess.

It could have been a victory or it could have been a defeat.

And I was already so tired . . .

It would've taken a painful walk over the ruins of what we had for a such a brief instant to build everything back and the result was yet unknown.

To build . . . or to try and build at last, because Faith was all gone and only the Slayer was left. And maybe a part of me ached to see what happens when only the Slayer is left.

So . . . I never walked back to her . . . I walked to Angel . . . and she let me.

And I hate her for that even more. Because she had always been all about the fight but for me she behaved as a coward would.

Or maybe I'm reading it all wrong maybe I was the real coward.

Does it still matter? After all this time.

After she choose the Mayor over me.

The thought still wrenches trough me like a knife blade. Cruel and cold and all mine to hate.

He had cared for her and that had killed him.

Is that what Faith does? She brings death to the ones that loves her. I wonder.

But in the dreamscape where everything is pure and real life doesn't shape the truth with hate, pain, regret and lies, she choose me over him. For real. And I'm sure that a small part of her hate that thought.

That thought that forced me or maybe allowed me to let her go.

After she got back her beauty and after I got back my shell.

I used to think that she hated me back then and for real.

But . . .

Maybe I'm still reading it all wrong and all she did after I walked back to Angel was to scream and scream and scream that she loved me but wasn't happy about it.

And wanted that love to die.

After all, the loss of love had turned Willow into a killer, and true the situation was quite different yet still there was the loss of love for Faith or at last she thought so. Not that I gave her any reason to think otherwise, not that I wanted her to think otherwise.

And Angel saved her at the end.

He saved her from herself and from me.

He succeeded where I failed.

He saved a Slayer that wasn't his Buffy.

Poetic much.

He saved a Slayer that was mine to save. And that tied their souls together in a way I could never touch or understand and for that alone I hate the both of them. But not really.

And we are there now, sharing a mansion with a thousand Slayers in Cleveland.

And she is with him. A couple for real. Faith and Robin. He tried to kill my Spike once and I stopped him and now he took Faith away from me and I don't know how stop him and more important, I don't know if Faith wants me to try.

And I am already so tired.

I see him holding her and I know that his arms are too weak.

She knows that to.

But neither of us is saying a word.

She can't fool me. Even if sometimes I wish she could.

Her softer looks can't fool me.

She wear white shirts now and pale jeans and every morning she tries to tame her hair into a resemblance of order.

Without mercy.

When we both know that only mercy can safe the two of us.

Again

Maybe her redemption is not only hers. Maybe is ours. Maybe is mine.

As if only love can redeem us. Shared destiny as it should have been from the beginning.

That's why right now I'm sitting on the floor of my room and my back is pressed against the wall and it feels so cold

And I can hear him in her room.

And it gets even colder.

I hear him, his pleasure, his love as she gives everything to him because she is never greedy in bed.

I strain to hear her voice, ready to welcome the pain but . . . I listen every night and I never hear her.

Guess she is not much of a screamer then . . . but then I know better.

Maybe prison forced silence over her pleasure . . . or maybe I was the only one.

And the latter possibility make me shiver out of hope and fear. And I should just go and ask Xander. But I don't want to. Because when it comes to her it's always a blending of everything.

I hear him leaving at last. She never let him stay not yet at last.

I fear that day.

Maybe it's fear. Maybe fear is the only force that really spring human beings into action.

Maybe I'm insane but I don't care as my body tense and shiver and suddenly as in a daze I'm walking out of my room, painfully, but happily drugged with the weird excitement of someone that has nothing to loose and finally . . . I walk toward her.

I ache all over.

We could never be friends. It's hate or love. No middle ground for us. And she knows the too, I trust her with the knowledge.

We can't pretend anymore, not now that all is quiet and not impending apocalypse are forcing us to swallow everything back. Or me at last. Because apocalypses never seemed to cramp her style.

The door is slightly ajar, as gently, as I could as quietly as I could manage, I step into her room.

It's small like my room. And smell of sex. Mine doesn't. It's all shady and soft, because even if the space is small the weak lamp resting on the bed table really can't do any better.

But it's okay. I like it. It's like Faith.

She is walking around fumbling over furniture and kicking around stuff as if she is looking for something.

I look her down as fast as I can. I know she'll notice me in a instant, as I quiet as I was we feel each other. She is clad in a white tight shirt and a pair of white short. White suits her in a way. Weird. It brings out her eyes, so soft and so cruel and her dark messed locks spilling over the white clothes are a beautiful sight. Dark wild rivulets over a pale sea.

Seeing her sleeping without a care in the world and naked over white silk must sums up everything that's perfection in splendour. I wonder. And also I wonder while I make up creepy senseless sentences everytime time she is involved.

"B?" Her husky voice shapes my name. The name she gave me. I stand still unable to move.

Looking genuinely concerned she walks to me. "Something happened?" She is standing right in front of me. Her body a few inch away from mine.

I can't look at her. I just breath in her scent sharply.

Smoke, night, leather, sex, pain, tenderness the scent of everything that's Faith is still clinging on her skin.

I can't smell him. And for that I'm glad.

"I heard Robin." I whisper unable to keep the trembling out of my voice. Her brow furrows for an instant, little lines form on her forehead, it lasts a second though, because I smile and maybe out of habit or out of surprise her face too relax into a smirk. Her dimples barely visible before greet my eyes with aching familiarity.

"Sorry about that." She isn't sorry, of course. She isn't sorry at all and for that I love and hate her a bit more. "Boy is kinda loud or maybe I'm kinda good. Who knows huh B?" Her voice crack a little, it's barely a hint , a quiet veil of sorrow dancing over the words just a little .

And I do know bitch. I fucking do! Have you already forgotten? She hasn't. I know that she hasn't! I know by her hurt, tender and nostalgic gaze. I know that she is aching all over, just like me.

"I heard him leaving, thought something had happened." I shrug really fast. Really, I move my shoulders up and down madly and I'm already mentally pointing an accusing finger toward my previous braveness.

I wish I could just disappear. Robin is a good brave man, he is gentle and he respects her and maybe I have no right to . . .

"He always leaves B" The husky whisper reach me. Her voice is laced with sadness and sweetness and for a terrible instant she looks empty and fireless. I hate that.

And I know that is not Robin leaving that forced that emptiness to swallow her, that hopeless emptiness belong to me alone. I want her fire back. I almost violently search her eyes and forcefully I stare at her.

And I see it crackling and burning, dancing shyly in the deep of her eyes.

Our fire.

"Do you have a fucking lighter?" She breaks the gaze at last and start rummaging through weapons and magazines again. Her room is a real mess. "Can't find mine." She grunt through a sheepish pout "'Course you don't have one, but whatever two set of Slayer's eyes are better that one. Help me search . . . "

I rummage through the back pocket of my jeans for an instant. My sweaty hand cringe painfully against the tight garment but soon my fingers graze the familiar cold surface. I pull my hand out as struggling as little bit to Faith's amusement, she is staring at me now but her hair are shading her face from me. And I long to see her face.

"Wicked" The familiar word leaves her lips as she flashes me a smirk as I smugly hold a shining Zippo in front of her face.

"Resourceful B." She raises an eyebrow acting casual as fishing a random cigarette from over her bedside table. But I know the truth. I know you Faith.

"It was Spike's." My low suddenly dry voice inform her.

"He was a good." She nods briefly and I know she is sincere.

"Look, can't smoke in the room even if is my room. Giles' rules." She steps outside and into that small balcony and I have not the heart to tell her that she had handed me the lighter back without actually lighting the cigarette. I stroke the crafted metallic surface for a moment before pushing it back into my pocket.

She is standing stiff. Her back is facing me and I can see by the work of her muscles that she is tense and even shivering maybe.

But not from the cold cause even if the air is chilling she is always warm.

Always had been.

A soft breeze mould her hair into a gentle dance as she stands unmoving and even in her stillness she looks untamed to me.

Something crack into me that very instant, as I focus my eyes on the image of her standing alone in the middle of a drop of night and stars, looking perfect and appearing so tragic that I've never seen such a aching work of art my whole life.

The sight steals my mind away.

I want to run from her but I catch a sound, a pained whisper, wet and dry at the same time, and it pierces through my skin.

It hurts.

She is alone.

As alone as I am.

Even enclosed by people the two us are still alone.

My heartbeat. She always forced a violent rhythm over my heartbeat. It's deafening right now.

I rush to her. She doesn't move, only swallow back a gush of air and bent forward a little as I crash by body into her back, fiercely winding my arms around her middle as I press my cheek against the smooth space between her shoulder blade, forcefully, desperately daring her to push me away, even if I know that she'll never do that.

I melt into her and she lets me.

"I hate you." The crack in my voice and the harsh ragged whispering betrays my tears.

And I feel her warm hand, shyly covering mine, the softness of her skin, the scent of her, the whisper of dark velvet like tresses against my cheek and the madness of her heartbeat that reverberate though me and blend with my own. It's a perfect synchrony and to that I remember everything. Everything of her, of us, every shades, every cracks. All notes of a tune I know so well. A tune I longed to hear again for so long.

"I hate you more B." Her voice had never been so gentle. So achingly tender and innocent.

"But not really Faith." I tremble against her.

"Never really B." A half choked sound I can't define, cracks her voice in mid sentence.

And I tighten my arms around her warmly and gently, turning my desperate hold into an embrace she'll never leave willingly. I know that. She sighs. Faith sighs funnily, it's like a resigned tired breath yet it holds an almost cheerful hopeful quality.

As if she wants something but is not sure. And the sigh announces that she is disposed to fight for it.

"I'll go buy you a fucking lighter tomorrow. How is that?" I ask and hold my breath forcing myself to not breath in her scent.

And I just wait.

I don't need words, I just need to see her eyes and I'll know.

She turns around after a good eternity, and when I meet her gaze and I feel powerful and full. I burn all over again.

That look . . .

That look is back. The look only I can put in her eyes. That look is mine.

It's belong to me. It's us. All over again.

FIN

Author's note: even if I have a burning passion for the English language; English is not my native language, so you will, surely, find bad grammar mistakes here and there. I'm really sorry about it. Running a spell-checker again and again doesn't always helps with grammar mistakes. Sorry


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